Bambi
by Pink Ants
Summary: Beckett and Castle are together and with their new found relationship comes bumps in the road. What will happen when a curve ball gets thrown their way?
1. Chapter 1

A buzzing wakes her from her peaceful slumber, keeping her eyes closed she tries to regain consciousness. She rolls over trying to locate the noise without opening her eyes and mumbles something even she doesn't understand. She shifts the sheet up to cover her a little, and reaches for the phone that she knows is on the bedside table.

"Hello?" She half whispers, the remnants of sleep still in her voice.

"Beckett?" Esposito asked at the other end of the phone.

"Yeah?"

"Am I interrupting something, should I call back later?" He asks with a sound of mirth in his voice.

"No… Nope, I'm up. Did a body drop?" She shifts to sit up, trying to sound more awake.

"Well not exactly. We are holding someone here that's only going to speak to you, says it's a family matter. She asked to give you a message."

She waits for it and when he doesn't answer, she prompts. "Esposito."

"Oh yeah right, she said 'tell here Bambi is in the woods, the fire is getting closer and the damn deer needs your help.' Just running us in circles if you ask me but I figured I would call to check to see if it means anything to you." He sounds feed up and tired, like he knows this is going to be a dead end.

She pauses as she takes the word in and absorbs them. "I will be right in." She says in a solum tone.

"Right boss." She hears Esposito say as she hangs up, but she is already on autopilot. She shifts to get out of bed but stops when she feels a hand grab her thigh.

"Where do you thin your going?" He hasn't opened his eyes but from the sound of his voice and his movements he has been awake as long as she has, if not longer.

"Got a call, I have to go in." She snuggles down again and allows herself time to give him a quick kiss on the lips before she has to leave their sanctuary, one minute won't matter in the long run right?

"But it's your day off." He pouts after he kisses her back, moving his other hand to cup her breast. He tries to deepen the kiss but she won't let him.

"Not now Rick, I have to go." She moves out of the bed taking the sheet to wrap around her naked body. Going over to her chest of draws and grabbing some fresh clothes.

He leans up on one elbow, looking at her from the bed. "Can't someone else fight the bad guys today?"

"Sorry Castle but this is a personal errand." She puts on some dark jeans and her grey shirt, throwing on her signature black leather jacket over the top.

"Can I come with you?" He asks moving behind her, kissing her neck.

She turns to stare at him, looking into his eyes thinking for a moment. "Only if you're quick, you have five minutes. I will be waiting downstairs."

"Your no fun!" He smirks as he moves towards his chest of drawers to grab some clothes out.

As she waits for him in the kitchen of the loft she thinks about the past few months. They have been seeing each other for a while now and although they seem to be moving quickly, they have really been in a relationship for three years. Three years of verbal foreplay could not have prepared her for the feelings she had when she dived into this with him head on. Everything just seemed to fall into place, next thing she knew she had clothes at his place and there was less and less point of having her own apartment, not that she would ever tell Castle that. She still needed her own space, an escape route if she needed it.

"Ready?" He yelled as he bounded down the stairs towards her breaking her from her thoughts.

She looked at him and smiled leaning up to give him a chaste kiss on the lips.

"Lets go." As they walked out the door together.


	2. Chapter 2

Hey guys thanks for reading, please please please leave a review so I can improve this story and make your read more enjoyable.

Now on with the story…

xx

Kate drives to the precinct as always as he plays with the buttons on the radio. The journey is short and they don't feel the need to talk as her thoughts begin to wonder. When they arrive and walk through the car park he takes her hand letting go before they reach the door. As they get out of the elevator she calls toward Esposito.

"What room is she in?" She walks past him as he calls out. "Interrogation room 2."

"Call her foster family, they will need to know she's here." She calls as she walks off.

As they reach the room she turns to Castle.

"Wait behind the glass this time, ok?" Kate reaches up and brushes her hand on his cheek.

"Sure" He half smiles at her and moves to the viewing room.

Kate walks up to the door and takes a deep breath before opening it, when she does she sees a small girl sitting on the opposite side of the table. Her hair is dark black and long with straight bangs framing her face, there are small plaits through her hair with the occasional strand of a deep blue and purple. Her eyes are dark and surrounded by thick heavy eyeliner that has smudged at the edges. Her frame is tiny with bones seeming to pop out of her pale skin, the dark loose top and short skirt barely covering it. The only splash of color is her tights that have a galaxy pattern on them. The girl is flicking a pack of smokes against the table and only pauses when she hears Kate walk in. They look at each other for a moment before she sits down in front of her.

She sits there for a moment staring at the girl before she begins "Procession? You promised me you had finished with all that stuff."

"Nice to see you too Katherine. How's life treating you? Still fucking around with that doctor?" The girl practically spat the words out.

"Don't deflect Cassie, what were you doing with that amount of drugs on you?" She snapped back not giving the girl an inch.

"Oh you know what they say, the quickest way to get out of a foster home is land yourself in jail." Cassie smirked back at her.

"This is not a joke Cassie. You promised me you would not go back to that, you said you would try this time." Kate pleaded with her, trying to get more than deflection from the girl.

"Leopard doesn't change its spots." The girl shifts in her chair, leans back and puts her shoes on the table. Cassie slowly takes a smoke from the pack and places it to her lips.

"You can't smoke that in here." Cassie ignores Kate and lights the cigarette anyway, blowing the smoke into the air.

"Tell me what happened Cassie, why did you go back? I thought you liked your new family." Kate moved to the other side of the table sitting against it, making it though she was taller than Cassie, trying to intimidate her into talking.

"Nobody said I liked them." Cassie snarled at her.

"Cassie you were the one that asked for me. You pulled me out here on my day off, knowing I would come when you asked for help. So what do you want me to do? Unless you start talking Cassie I am walking out that door and I am not coming back." She yelled at the girl gaining momentum.

"You already left Katherine." Cassie stood practically spitting at her, smoke blowing into her face.

Kate stood and stormed over to the door. "Wait here." She said sternly before slamming the door behind her.

Castle stood still behind the glass, watching the girl slump back down into the chair and take another long drag of her smoke before stubbing it out on the table. He startled when Beckett rushed through the door of the viewing room. He watched as she walked over to a stack of folders and throws them into the air letting out an exasperated gasp. He stayed silent as she took a few deep breaths and then as she turned towards him he waited for her to come to him. As she got closer he bent down and placed a kiss on the top of her head. As Kate continued to take calming breaths she rested her forehead on his almost as if she was trying to suck her strength from Castle.

"You ok?" He asked after a moment.

"Yeah, I think." She replies in a small voice.

"I have never seen you lose it like that." He replies moving his hand to grasp hers down by their sides.

"I wasn't supposed to see her in this situation again, she promised me that she was done. I should have looked out for her more, made sure that this wouldn't happen." She mumbled into his chest.

"Who is she?" He whispered.

"I first met Cassie about a year before you decided to stick yourself to me like glue." She half smiled up at him.

"Hey, it's not like you don't like it." He replied to her.

"I know, I know. We met on a case and she was so scared, she was involved with some pretty bad people and she needed protection. I promised her no one would hurt her, so for a while she came and stayed with me so no one could find her. It wasn't normal protocol but she trusted me and I felt… she needed someone and I was there. She stayed with me throughout the trial as well and we would stay up late watching movies her favorite being…"

"Bambi." Castle interrupted.

"When the trial finished she needed to be put into a foster home. She begged to stay with me but she had issues, I couldn't look after her and keep my job, it would have been too much. So as a compromise I helped her look for a new foster family to make sure she would be settled." By the end of it Kate sounded sad and deflated.

"Hey you did the best you could love." Castle reached up to stroke her cheek.

"The thing is she made a deal so she would testify against the suspect. Because she has been found with contraband on her person she had broken the agreement that was made and faces real jail time." Kate sighed out.

"And you care about her so you don't want that to happen." Castle tried to give some form of comfort in his words.

"I just don't understand how this could happen, I mean why didn't her foster family notice something was up? How could they not have realized she was spinning out of control again?" Kate growled out.

Just then there was a knock at the door and Esposito popped his head in. "Yo Kate we tried to get in contact with the foster family."

"Yeah so?" Kate turned towards him.

"So here's the thing, the foster family hasn't seen her in weeks. They have been trying to find her through child welfare but nothing popped until now. They had already taken on a new kid in the time she has been gone and they can't afford to take her back. Since the paperwork has already gone through they no longer have legal responsibility to her." Esposito finished.

"What is going on here? Surely they didn't process all this that quickly. It doesn't make any sense." Castle stated as Kate turned back towards the glass.

"I don't know but I am going to find out." Kate said striding out of the room.


	3. Chapter 3

Kate took another breath before moving into the interrogation room again. When she walked in Cassie sat up slightly, her attention drawn to Kate. Kate walked slowly over to her and sat down opposite.

"Cassie, for me to get you out of this you need to start talking." Kate pleaded with the girl.

"What's the point? It's jail or going back to that fucking family, and to be honest with you I would rather rot in prison than go back to that household." She said her tone neutral noting giving Kate much to work with.

"You won't be going back to them Cassie, you walked out on them, they haven't seen you in weeks. They have already started to look after someone else." Kate stated trying to get some reaction from the girl, thankfully she took the bait.

"What? Someone else is there already?" Cassie questioned.

"You need to explain to me what's been going on Cass." Kate leaned across the table and whispered.

"You shouldn't have left me there. I had to get away from them and no one was there to help me. You hadn't come to see me in so long and no one else believed me." Cassie replied, and for the first time that day she sounded small to Kate. It was true she hadn't gone to see the girl since the shooting but as far as she knew the girl was doing fine, she had other things to worry about.

"I know, and I'm sorry Cass but the last time I saw you, you were doing well and everything was starting to go back to normal." Kate reached over to grab her hand but the girl recoiled quickly and sat up abruptly like she had been hit by lightning.

"Do I need a lawyer?" Cassie asked looking up from the table where her gaze had been fixed and straight into Kate's eyes.

"I really don't want it to come to that Cassie, I want to protect you, help you but to do that I need to know what has been going on." Kate said softly not breaking the girls gaze.

"It started happening a little bit before you stopped coming, then it started getting worse when I knew you weren't coming back. He was the worst and then she blamed it all on me, saying it was my fault that these things were happening. She wouldn't feed me for days saying it was what I disserved for what I had caused. I tried to tell the social worker that visited but they were the picture perfect family and the young ones said that I had started using again and that I would go out for days and not come home. Of curse they believed them because I was a troubled child and it was common for kids like me to fall back into old habits. When it all got too much I packed my bag and went to the overpass. I started using again...and don't give me that look because you know what that house it like Katherine. The new habit meant I needed money and quick so I started doing favors for people and that's when your guys found me." She trailed off her eyes going back to the table.

"Cassie why didn't you tell someone else?" Kate inquired

"No one believed me! You were not here to back me up and tell them that I wasn't crazy or a vindictive bitch. They kept saying that I would have to be put in a psycho ward if I wasn't careful." Cassie raised her voice to this looking slightly flushed.

"Cassie, I am so sorry. Please I am going to help you ok?" The girl just nodded mutely as Kate stood up to leave the room. "Do you want anything to eat or drink while your here?" The girl nodded her head no, and with that Kate left the room.

As she slid into the viewing room she saw Castle and instantly locked eyes with him. She walked strait over to him and kissed him soundly on the lips.

"What was that for?" He asked her when they finally came up for air.

Still in his embrace she shifted so she could look into his eyes when talking, although he supported all her weight as he was still leaning against the table. "That was for being you, for looking after Alexis and me when we needed it."

"That's what I do, no need to thank Me." he chuckled back at her, moving some hair from her face.

"No you don't have to, but you do and sometimes I think I take it for granted." She murmured into his neck.

"Well, I like doing it, so I guess your stuck with it." He smiled.

"What am I going to do about Cassie? I can't let her go to jail but she is looking at facing some serious time." Kate sighed out.

"Do you think she is telling the truth, about the family I mean?" Castle questioned, shifting so that Kate was sitting on the table next to him, lacing their fingers together.

"Back when I was looking after her, we made a promise never to lie to each other and I know she wouldn't break that." Kate leaned against Castle as she spoke.

"She really trusts you doesn't she?" Castle asked.

"Yeah she does." Kate replied, they then fell into a comfortable science while trying to work out what they could do about Cassie. After a moment or two Castle began to speak.

"Ok you can call me crazy but hear my idea out before you interrupt ok?" Castle started, waiting for conformation from Kate before he continues, when he got a slight nod he launched into it.

"What if Cassie came to live with you, or more us in the loft?" Kate made a noise to interrupt but Castle put up a hand to stop her.

"What did I say about interrupting? Think about it, you could talk to the people about letting her off under the condition that she is left into your custody. She trusts you probably more than she trusts anyone right now Kate and I could not imagine a finer role model for this girl. We can make sure she stays off the drugs and doesn't go back to that dark place she was in. She can also start going to therapy, and not a shitty therapist wither, the finest money can buy. You can help her Kate and I can be beside you the whole time." Castle finished quickly as if it was a race to get all the words out.

"Rick, it's a nice gesture but that's asking a bit much of you. I mean you don't even know the girl, I wouldn't want to put any strain on your and Alexis' relationship either." Kate let out quietly.

"It won't, to be honest Alexis will probably be glad I'm distracted and you seem to trust her, that's enough for me." He said firmly.

"Wait here. /I will see what I can do." Kate said as she left the room.


End file.
